


Drunken Promises

by gracelinne



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-09
Updated: 2013-05-09
Packaged: 2017-12-10 22:15:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/790784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gracelinne/pseuds/gracelinne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eponine and Combeferre make a promise to each other when they're drunk.  Neither of them expects the other to keep it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drunken Promises

**Author's Note:**

> This had two different inspirations: one was this REALLY ADORABLE Ep/Ferre thing I read earlier with the same premise, and the other was that my best guy friend and one of his friends agreed that if they're both single when they're nineteen, they'll date. And then this was born.

They agreed on their future one night when they were twenty-one, as they lay next to each other on a grassy hillock, watching the stars.  They were drinking, both of them, a bottle of wine in his hands and a bottle of scotch in hers.  He pointed out Orion, Cygnus, the Perseids.  She pointed at her breasts and said "they should be constellations, there've been enough legends about 'em."

They were very different kinds of drunks.  She, on the one hand, turned fiery and obscene, whereas he watched and thought philosophically.  They both drank occasionally, but not frequently.  She knew how to handle her alcohol better than he did, though, given her upbringing.

"'Ferre, are we ever going to find someone?" she asked at one point, rolling her head so she was facing him.  He turned his head to look at her.

"I don't know, 'Ponine," he sighed, his thumb circling the lip of his wine bottle.  

"How about this," she started, looking back up at the sky.  "If we turn twenty-eight and we're both still single, we'll marry each other."  He grinned up at the darkness.

"Why twenty-eight?"

"I don't know, shut up."  They wrote it down on an old grocery list and they both signed it.   _In the event that both Eponine and Combeferre are still single when they are twenty-eight, they will marry each other._  He put it in his pocket. _  
_

Seven years passed, and they dated other people -- him, a girl called Marielle who broke his heart, her, Montparnasse.  She lived with Grantaire, and came to meetings at the Musain regularly.  They all noticed the bruises that so often adorned her arms, collarbone, and cheek, but no one said anything for fear of releasing the Wrath of Eponine.  The Wrath was a highly feared phenomenon that only happened when people asked personal questions.  So, in time, they stopped asking personal questions.  Eventually, though, she showed up to a meeting with a badly concealed black eye and a split lip.  Her wrist was in a brace and she was limping.

"Are you okay?!" was the general cry of shock when she walked in.  She smiled painfully.

"I'm grand.  I got into a fist fight with Azelma, though, and she punches hard."  Everyone seemed to accept this and turned back to their work, but Combeferre watched her all throughout the meeting.  He noticed how she flinched when Courfeyrac went to hug her.  She pulled her phone from her pocket, read the message, and stood up, slipping out the door before anyone could ask her why.  He shook his head and forgot about it.

Until she neglected to come to a meeting.  This was extremely unusual, since Les Amis were practically her family.  They called her cell and her home phone, but she didn't pick up either time.  So they went to the new apartment she lived in (she'd moved out of Grantaire's when a distant relative died and she came into some money) and found her unconscious with a broken wrist.  They called 112 and waited with her until the ambulance came.  Grantaire rode with her to the hospital, where they set her wrist and kept her overnight.  She had three broken ribs, too.  When Les Amis were done with him, Montparnasse was single with a concussion and a broken femur.  It was well-deserved.

On her twenty-eighth birthday, March twelfth, Combeferre visited her apartment.

"Happy birthday," he said, grinning down at her.  She smiled up at him and invited him in for a cup of coffee.  When they were sitting down at the table, hands around mugs, he unfolded a piece of paper and handed it to her.  

"You kept this?" she asked, her eyes skimming it, brows raised.  He nodded.

"Yep.  Still want to?"  She grinned.

"Oh, hell yes.  I'm going to want a ring, though."  He produced one, seemingly from midair, and handed it to her.  Seeing her expression, he explained.

"It was my great-grandmother's and I didn't have any use for it, so I figured hey, why not."  She nodded and rooted around in her room, eventually coming up with a RingPop they could use until they got to the jeweler's.  He wore it faithfully (but they went that afternoon).  Les Amis noticed almost immediately, starting with Courfeyrac, who wiggled his eyebrows at Combeferre.

The wedding was a quiet event, with only Les Amis there (they didn't even tell Combeferre's parents it was happening), and when they were instructed to kiss, they did so with much giggling.  Eponine thought platonic kisses should be a regular thing.  

They bought a small house for themselves, and decorated it together.  They didn't disagree on anything, strangely enough, and soon the house was furnished cozily, with bookcases and Beatles posters and Van Gogh paintings, an eccentrc mix of their styles.  

Affection wasn't their thing, but they found themselves unconsciously becoming closer.  While Combeferre was reading, Eponine would watch TV, curled up against the arm of the couch, and he'd stretch out his legs so they trapped her there.  Kisses didn't happen exceedingly, but he'd sometimes press a kiss to her forehead when he passed her in the kitchen or she'd kiss his cheek when she got home.  It was a routine that worked.  

They slept in the same room, in the same bed, which Eponine hadn't expected -- she'd expected maybe a 'here's your room and here's mine' but sleeping together was nice.  Sex wasn't their thing either; mostly just cuddles.  Eventually they adopted a little girl called Fleur from an orphanage in northern Paris.  They had a very unique family dynamic, and it was more relaxed for it.  They almost never fought.  

When Fleur got married, she married for love, not for companionship.  They liked the boy she married (if only because it was Courfeyrac and Jehan's son) and they cried at the wedding.  Both of them.  At the same time.  

One night, after Combeferre had passed away and Eponine could feel her time coming to an end, she was cleaning out their old dresser when she came upon a cellophane package.  She unwrapped it to find that very same RingPop she'd given Combeferre all those years ago.


End file.
